Buffini's Thatcher play Handbagged and Red Velvet feature in new Tricycle season

The new season at the Tricycle Theatre features the premiere of Moira Buffini's new play about Margaret Thatcher and the return of Red Velvet starring Adrian Lester.

Adrian Lester as Ira Aldridge in Red Velvet
The season opens in September with the UK premiere of Colman Domingo's A Boy and His Soul, which transfers to the Tricycle following an award-winning premiere in New York.

Running from 9 to 21 September (previews from 4 September), the play, which is directed by Titas Halder, is a coming of age story set in ‘70's and '80's Philadelphia.

It's followed by the world premiere of Handbagged – Moira Buffini's take on the relationship between the Queen and Prime Minister Margaret Thatcher, based on her short play from Women, Power & Politics.

The play, which runs from 1 October to 9 November (previews from 26 September), is directed by Indhu Rubasingham and stars Stella Gonet as Margaret Thatcher and Marion Bailey as Elizabeth II.

Next up, Kathy Burke directs a major revival of Mary J O'Malley's convent school-set comedy Once a Catholic, running from 27 November to 18 January (previews from 21 November).

Burke returns to the Tricycle having previously directed a revival of The Quare Fellow in 2005.

To complete the season, the multi-award-winning Red Velvet written by Lolita Chakrabarti and directed by Rubasingham, returns to the theatre ahead of its transfer to New York.

Running from 23 January to 8 March 2014, the production will see Adrian Lester reprise his WhatsOnStage Award-nominated role as Victorian actor Ira Aldridge.

Artistic director Indhu Rubasingham said today: "It's not only the developments on stage that make this season special, for the first time in the Tricycle's history we are introducing allocated seating throughout the auditorium, enabling us to offer a lower ticket price of just £8.

"We are also revitalising our Creative Learning Programme, by taking more workshops into school to reach out to children without access to theatre, relaunching our Young Company, and in March next year we will throw open our building to the them for Tricycle Takeover enabling them to stage brand new works across our spaces.

"It's an exciting time for the company, seeing us collaborate with so many writers, actors, and directors, and to reach out to new audiences both here, and in the US, with such a diversity of work."

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